Overclocking Error

[hatefly]

My computer recently crashed, and I have no idea what is wrong with it.

My only clue is an error I got on my screen before the big dump. The error says from top to bottom:

512IMS V1.0 052108
Intel (R) Core(TM)2 CPU E8400 @ 3.00GHz, Speed: 333x9=3000MHz

RAM Frequency For DDR2 800 (Duel Channel)

Initializing USB Controllers .. Done.
WARNING !!! The previous performance of overclocking is failed, and the system is restored to the default setting, press any key except "DEL" to enter SETUP.....

Keep current BIOS settings? (Y/N)
Press [Y] to continue or press [N] to load some item default setting.

Anyways, I do not recall ever changing anything as far as overclocking goes, so i just kept the current BIOS settings. I was able to log into my system with no issues. Then, I got a blue screen of death with some errors (screen pop was much to fast for me to get a pic or even read it all) and now my system is dead.

System powers on; fans, lights, everything powers on fine. Problem is, I get absolutely nothing on my screen now. Not even a ready curser. Wont boot to post... Nothing.

Maybe I'm wrong, but my gut is telling me either my RAM or my Vid Card is going nuts...

Other Info:

My Mobo came with a program to OC direct from software. Never used it though. Also, on power on, system powered on and then cycled off for a moment, then back on. Almost like a soft reset. (never seen or heard of that happening before) I have taken other measures to check my PSU and it seems to be running just fine.

 

[sportsfanboy]

Unplug your PC from the wall- Remove the bios battery- Short the jumpers, then move it back to the original position- reconnect power and try to boot.

 

[sportsfanboy]

obviously put the battery back in first, lol

 

[wolfram23]

Yea, reset the CMOS with the jumper and unplug the PC for a few minutes.

Also, use that time to open it up and clean it out - dust kills PCs. Works great if you blow a compressed duster through all heat sinks.

 

[hatefly]

Unplug your PC from the wall- Remove the bios battery- Short the jumpers, then move it back to the original position- reconnect power and try to boot.

Sorry for the noob question. When you say "short the jumpers" i'm kinda lost at this point. Never had to do that before so I honestly don't know how. Any quick explanation?

I'm using an MSI P45 Platinum Mobo.

Tried to do a google on it, but came up short

 

[wolfram23]

Sorry for the noob question. When you say "short the jumpers" i'm kinda lost at this point. Never had to do that before so I honestly don't know how. Any quick explanation?

I'm using an MSI P45 Platinum Mobo.

Tried to do a google on it, but came up short

Your mobo manual will say, but I have an MSI as well (P55 tho) and basically on mine, there's a battery (about 1" diameter, flat somewhat by the southbridge) and near it there's 3 pins, and 2 of them have a sleeve. Basically you move the sleeve to the currently uncovered and middle pins, wait a few seconds, and then put it back as was. This shorts the CMOS and resets it. Make sure your power is turned off (either unplug the PSU or turn off the switch). The first time I did this, it booted up right after on it's own lol.

 

[hatefly]

Your mobo manual will say, but I have an MSI as well (P55 tho) and basically on mine, there's a battery (about 1" diameter, flat somewhat by the southbridge) and near it there's 3 pins, and 2 of them have a sleeve. Basically you move the sleeve to the currently uncovered and middle pins, wait a few seconds, and then put it back as was. This shorts the CMOS and resets it. Make sure your power is turned off (either unplug the PSU or turn off the switch). The first time I did this, it booted up right after on it's own lol.

Sweet thanks a bunch. That sounds easy enough. At work right now, but i'll try this tonight. I hope this works.

Any idea on what could cause this problem I have in the first place?

 

[sportsfanboy]

It happens when overclocking sometimes. Some motherboards recover better/easier from bad overclocks. Your machine is probably fine, just needs different bios settings.

 

[hatefly]

OK, so went home and tried that, and everything worked just fine. I did some updates, did a restart... worked. Last night i shut the system down and this morning same thing. Nothing, just dead

One thing i noticed was that my CPU was listed as 333x6 or 2k. On the error i first got, the system said 333x9 or 3k. When i got it up last night on my cell menu the top portion listed the 333x6 (current) but my CPU max value listed below was the 333x9.

Now, i left the settings just like that - it was the optimized defaults - I thought my processor was a 3ghz chip, so i figured the 3k should be OK.

I'm lost as to what the problem is Anyone have any other ideas? should i try the BIOS reset once more and change my values down to 333x6 - assuming that works again?

 

[wolfram23]

So you reset it, and it worked, then did you change anything? Or did it just not work all over again? I'm a bit out of ideas but maybe post a new thread and make sure you post all your system specs - CPU, GPU, Mobo, PSU, RAM.

If you haven't even changed the settings but it's not working, it sounds like hardware issues. However, I've had the failed overclock screen but they were because of failed overclocks. Usually due to insufficient Vtt voltage sometimes Vcore.

Not a whole lot of CPUs are 3ghz at stock, so it's important to list which you have and maybe someone with the same CPU can help you out.

 

[hatefly]

So you reset it, and it worked, then did you change anything? Or did it just not work all over again? I'm a bit out of ideas but maybe post a new thread and make sure you post all your system specs - CPU, GPU, Mobo, PSU, RAM.

If you haven't even changed the settings but it's not working, it sounds like hardware issues. However, I've had the failed overclock screen but they were because of failed overclocks. Usually due to insufficient Vtt voltage sometimes Vcore.

Not a whole lot of CPUs are 3ghz at stock, so it's important to list which you have and maybe someone with the same CPU can help you out.

Yeah, everything worked just fine. Now nothing

and yeah, i looked up my order when I got my CPU. This is what I have

Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 Processor BX80570E8400 - 3.0GHz, 6MB Cache, 1333MHz FSB, Wolfdale, Dual-Core, Retail, Socket 775

 

[wolfram23]

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/249670-29-e8400-fail-overclocking

According to this, it's the RAM not being set properly. Look into it.

Looks like a very specific CPU/mobo combo issue. Hope this helps.

 

[hatefly]

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/249670-29-e8400-fail-overclocking

According to this, it's the RAM not being set properly. Look into it.

Looks like a very specific CPU/mobo combo issue. Hope this helps.

Hmm... i think kthis had to do with the combo of the board and im pretty sure mine only takes DDR2. However, everything else seems to jive with that report of theirs and if i remember correctly it did have my mem listed as 1066... so this is saying that i should make sure that it is set at 800?

 

[wolfram23]

Hey so I just had a very scary scenario with my PC, sounds almost exactly like your issue... except I caused it while running Intel Burn Test to check an OC (all I did was raise BCLK by 5 but anyway, not the point). So basically it crashed on me, rebooted to login screen then BSOD, then after that I only got to login screen once but mostly it was in a POST loop or crashing at "windows loading" screen. Sometimes the screen would go blank and not come back on when the PC rebooted. I tried resetting CMOS, loading failsafe defaults, loading optimized defaults, loading my 175x21 OC profile that I was using for a long time... nothing helped. Finally I just unplugged it for a while, jumped the CMOS again, let it sit... plugged it back in after maybe 10 mins, first thing it did was reboot, but then I got to the window asking to load windows normally or in safety mode. Figured I'd give safety a try but it crashed while loading the files. Rebooted, this time it asked if I'd like to do the windows repair since it failed to load, I said yes and it actually booted to the repair and ran it. Didn't find any issues. Went to advanced options and ran the memory test, again ran fine but when it finished it booted to windows... and it worked! Except that my notifications area wasn't showing any icons. So, I just did a normal reboot... and so far it's working (I'm on it right now). I have yet to try getting my settings back to where they were, but I feel fairly confident that I fixed it. Anyway, I hope my experience my help you a bit. Seems like the windows repair thing might have done the trick... or maybe just letting it sit turned off... then again, maybe it'll crash on me soon... We'll see

 

[wolfram23]

Update: yep, crashed. I tried loading XMP profile so only 160 bclk and it wouldn't boot. Same issues, except now it's not going to POST. Left it unplugged all night, reset CMOS, still nothing. I just hope the 2 yr warranties I bought will cover the CPU considering I did lapping on it. Unless it's the mobo that's broken. Bleh going to have to bring it in tonight. Sucks so much.

 

[sportsfanboy]

The cpu won't be covered if you lapped it, that said, I don't believe your cpu is faulty

 

[hatefly]

Update: yep, crashed. I tried loading XMP profile so only 160 bclk and it wouldn't boot. Same issues, except now it's not going to POST. Left it unplugged all night, reset CMOS, still nothing. I just hope the 2 yr warranties I bought will cover the CPU considering I did lapping on it. Unless it's the mobo that's broken. Bleh going to have to bring it in tonight. Sucks so much.

damn man... that sucks

And yeah, some of that sounds very similar to what was going on with my machine. I tried to clear the CMOS with the buttons last night... nothing. Unplugged and took the bat out and that did the trick. I'm able to boot to post just fine.

I left it sitting on post all last night to see if it would fry out on me overnight like it has been. So far so good. I just need to figure out what settings the dang thing wants from me.

Question though: Will changing my settings on RAM to - current at 1067 - down to :800 make a difference? I'm using DDR2 Patriot Viper IIRC. I can prob get full specs on them soon...

 

[wolfram23]

hatefly: yes, it makes a difference. Running at higher speeds needs either extra voltage orhigher timings to remain stable. For example my RAM is rated for 1600mhz (DDR3) CL8, but with my OC it's at 1750 CL9 (My failed OC was trying to get it stable at 180bclk, so 1800mhz ram CL9). I tried 1600mhz CL7, which XMP says can work at 1.7V, but even up to 1.75V it was only making it to the windows load screen before crashing.

Sportsfanboy: I hope you're right. It crashed with 1.283V Vtt, which is beyond Intel spec (1.21V) so I'm a little worried there, but it also happened during an Intel Burn Test. Basically my monitor shut down so I moved my mouse to get it back... and that was it, toast. It crashed and the problems began. I'm really, really hoping it's the mother board because like you said, the lapping probably voided my warranty. I guess the 2yr replacement plan I bought at the store was a waste for the CPU =/
I'm quite sure it's not the RAM tho because I managed to get the intel memory test to run and it passed fine. And it really shouldn't have anything to do with the GPU since I had it at stock settings, and wasn't stress testing it. Maybe it could be the PSU, but I didn't notice anything there as far as noise or smoke or smell goes, and several times I've put my hand back there to see how the air coming out is and the PSU has always been cool. This really only leaves CPU, Mobo, or maaayybe a broken HDD but that doesn't explain why it's not even going to POST now. Anyway, at lunch I'm going to first try to flash the BIOS from USB since I just updated to V1.8 on Friday I think. If that doesn't work I'll bring it in to the store and let them figure and replace whatever broke... *PLEASE DON'T BE THE CPU!!!*

Anyway, when I find out I'll update here.

 

[RJR]

Wolfram, your playing with fire going over 1.65v Vdimm...............risking the cpu

Hope everything works out for you.

 

[wolfram23]

Wolfram, your playing with fire going over 1.65v Vdimm...............risking the cpu

Hope everything works out for you.

Oh, that was a while back and at 1.75V without it working at the CL7 timings I just went "eh, eff this" and set it back to 1.65V. I think the thing that killed it was my Vtt at 1.28V, even tho I've ready many OCs going up to 1.3-1.35V for 4ghz OCs, and I only had it that high for a short time while testing...

Anyway, I should find out at the end of the week what I broke... =/

 

[RJR]

Nah, 1.28v vtt probably wouldn't kill the cpu, I've had mine higher than that for months (don't tell anyone) and it's fine.

Probably just the MB.

 

[wolfram23]

Nah, 1.28v vtt probably wouldn't kill the cpu, I've had mine higher than that for months (don't tell anyone) and it's fine.

Probably just the MB.

That's what I think too. Or, hope for at least... If it is the mobo tho, they don't have any more MSI P55GD65 boards so I'm not sure what I'll end up with, but at least it'll be free.

 

[wolfram23]

Well I talked to the techs. Dead motherboard.

Initially good news, they told me they'll have to get back to me on whether they'll cover a replacement due to it being overclocked. Which is really BS, since the mobo is featured as an overclocking mobo - supporting XMP, and it even has a nice little "instant overclock" button right on it. If using that voids warranties, there is some serious issues imo.